


One Felt Hat

by bottleofcasgrace



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Gen, Molly O'Brien - Freeform, also featuring, happens s7 onward, mentions of dead characters, the rest of the crew - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-25
Updated: 2015-01-25
Packaged: 2018-03-09 02:05:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3232196
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bottleofcasgrace/pseuds/bottleofcasgrace
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What happened to the Santa hat? And other unanswered questions about what happened next for Kira Nerys after Jadzia died... Follows past canon, mostly ignoring that Kira/Odo actually happened. This is a sequel, and I'd recommend reading Vyc's first (it's not long!).</p>
            </blockquote>





	One Felt Hat

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Christmas Fashions](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2860445) by [Vyc](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vyc/pseuds/Vyc). 



> This is a sequel to the fic Christmas Fashions Vyc wrote for my DS9 holiday card exchange, and spawned out of sending headcanons about what happened next. Two lines are taken directly from that (Italicized), and I'd highly recommend reading it first.

Kira's going through the duty rosters when she sees Ezri fiddling with something. She looks up at her, Ezri still puts her on edge, but maybe that's just left over from when Jadzia would make Terran butterflies appear in her stomach every time she saw those spots. She's not sure. Ezri notices her look up and thrusts the small piece of felt into her hands.

"Worf was going through Jadzia's things, and," Ezri pauses here, looking uncomfortable. "Jadzia would have wanted you to have it." Kira looks down at what's in her hands, and by the time she looks up from the red felt hat, Ezri has disappeared. It hasn't even been a year since Jadzia died, but a quick memory reminds her.

_"Dax, what are you doing?"_

_"Getting you into the Christmas spirit!"_

Kira doesn't bother finishing the duty rosters, she just walks out of Ops and leaves, hoping that no one will notice her tears.

Three days later is the anniversary of that day, and she stubbornly wears the hat all day. Benjamin doesn't even question it. He saw what had happened with Jadzia that first time, and he covered for her when she had to leave. He knows it's hard, he misses her too. She owes him so much, but he just nods, adding "As long as it doesn't interfere with your duties, Colonel." And that's that.

Once the Dominion War is over, Sisko is gone too… And so is Odo, and Miles, and it feels as though she's just losing everyone. Garak is gone too, and she never thought she would miss a _Cardassian_ but it is what it is. She's now in charge of Deep Space Nine, the station that's home, and it never should have been, but it is.

She's the one who waits, now. She doesn't need anyone to share her life with, and she doesn't want one either. She's waiting for her friends – for Sisko, for Odo, for Jadzia - for all the haunted ghosts of her past and she can only see clearly when she's with Molly, and Kirayoshi, and Keiko and Miles are there, and she feels like she's at home again finally, she finds quiet but Shakaar, Bareil, Lupaza, Furel still watch her, and she knows the fight isn't over.

One day, years later, a Starfleet ensign whispers a little too loudly to their friend asking about the hat. She knows she shouldn't, that the tears should have been the first sign that she could stop yelling. She didn't want to traumatize the poor girl, but it's suddenly like she's back, and arguing so many other fights. Ezri takes the ensign one way, and Julian takes her the other.

"You need to calm down," he tells her, and she sees his now lined face, and can't help comparing it to the baby face he had when he first came to DS9. She calms down and cries a little more. After that, she takes a few days off and goes to visit Keiko and Miles every year. Molly and Yoshi know that sometimes things are done by their parents to help them cope – Miles' PTSD is getting better every year, but he still has relapses – and it's a quiet judgement free zone for her to escape to.

Ziyal watches her from the shadows, and she knows that this isn't right, that she shouldn't take her expectations onto herself (not to mention everyone else's expectations), that she should talk to Ezri, to Julian, to someone, but she is content. She has a station to run, and then a ship, new regulations to learn, another position to maintain. A new uniform, one she wore years ago too, and she can't help but look at herself in the mirror and she knows this person, but she can't seem to reach it. She still wears the felt hat every year.

Garak sees her one day by chance - Cardassia has petitioned to join to the Federation (Not yet, thinks Kira, and yet she mourns for the new Cardassians being born each day into their unstable democracy) - and he looks better. He and Julian have been communicating more frequently, and she can't help but compare this new Cardassia to the one she saw before. Not as a child, no, but as a terrorist - leading Cardassians into battle against themselves. Perhaps time has helped him, perhaps it's the doctor.

Miles and Keiko take Molly and Yoshi to visit Bajor when they're older, Miles has some time off from Starfleet Academy, and Molly is excited to show Yoshi all the things she remembers. Kasidy is there, and Jake, and for a moment it feels better than it had before, but there are parts still missing. Kira sees them in the shadows, sees them waiting. She nods at her past, but then Molly comes, calling and yelling, and Kirayoshi stumbles after her, and she sees them and only them, and she smiles.

Molly grows up quickly, and Kirayoshi beside her, always beside her, never behind her, even if it was harder. She likes to think it's her influence, but she knows that Keiko and Miles are just as stubborn as she is, maybe more. It's an honest trait the boy – the man has earned. Her time is split between Bajor and Earth now, watching Molly fall in love, and missing all the times she had done the same.

She hears of the shuttle incident three days after it happens - the perks of being a retired vice-admiral - and she knows the Dax symbiont has been moved to its next host. She remembers what it was like to hold those memories in her head, for Jadzia to learn, and she avoids the new Dax at all costs. She has that ability now, self-control, something she never thought she'd learn. Two lifetimes is more than enough for her to know it. Besides, it hurts. It hurts more than when Jadzia died, and Dax joined with Ezri. Ezri joins her shadows the next day.

Finally, when Kasidy's child is all grown up, when Molly is the only one who comes to visit her anymore, when Julian settles on Cardassia, his face lined, and hair white, when Garak's solemn funeral has passed, Sisko returns. He's The Sisko now, funny how different he is and is not. Funny how different she was. Her hands are lined, but her temper is sharp, and she introduces him to his children, grandchildren, and the ones she has come to think of as hers. And she longs for the friends who have come to pass. She outranks him now – it's funny, how the Federation seemed to fear him, The Emmissary, but with her up in the ranks, they doesn't have that worry. He's the Emissary, a lot more now than before, but he's also Benjamin Sisko. He stays on Bajor, and she doesn't.

She's rarely lonely though. She has friends, enough to keep the darkness busy, and away, even at night. She can close her eyes and sleep without seeing Damar imprinted on the back of her eyelids. She calls it success. She is not sure if that is correct.

One day, she hands Molly a small piece of red fabric, worn from years of use, and folding, and Molly looks at her questioningly.

"This is the last time, Molly," and even as she says it, no tears come, although Molly's eyes are flooded. "I want you to have it. Jadzia would have wanted you to have it." And just like that, those same words that Ezri had said to her so many years before spark a moment of joy in her, so deep, and so light that all the shadows are bathed in it, and they envelope her, and she welcomes it. She welcomes the peace that they offer her. She is never the same after that.

She lives a few weeks longer, mostly due to their medicine, Starfleet's dislike of losing an old vice-admiral, but she is happy to finally see her prophets. She has missed her friends, and sometimes, when she feels lucky, she sends a wish through the wormhole, back all the way to that small planet, and she hopes he knows why she sent it. She is at peace, and as her eyes close, she wonders why she put off death so long.


End file.
